Community

NAACP: Killing Was Self-Defense

Associated Press

NAACP leaders on Monday demanded the release of a Georgia man imprisoned after killing another man on his property.

The rally at the Georgia Capitol was the African-American leaders' latest effort to free John McNeil, who is serving a life sentence for the 2005 shooting death of Brian Epp. McNeil is black. Epp is white.

McNeil maintains that he acted in self-defense. Police found Epp outside McNeil's Cobb County home. Epp had a knife. Police determined McNeil had not committed a crime, but Cobb County District Attorney Patrick Head still won a murder conviction.

NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous said McNeil's case proves that self-defense laws in the United States are not equally applied across racial lines.